Battle on the Border Lake Amistad 3-12-2006

Battle on the Border Journal

Wow!!! What a fishery. Let me tell you how it went at Amistad. In practice, Tammy and I concentrated on looking for fish that would either be spawning or at least hanging around in spawning areas. There was a full moon approaching as the tournament would end, so I figured, with water temperatures in the mid 60’s, bass would have reproduction on their minds. I was not wrong.

The first day, we looked in the backs of lots of pockets and coves in the mid lake area and found three that we felt had potential to produce big bags of bass. One small cove near the mouth of Canyon De Burro must have held upwards of 50 bass over 5 pounds either on beds or “sunning” themselves. It was an awesome sight with that many bass everywhere you looked. We caught none of these fish, but the next cove over, I caught one that I weighed at 8-7 and Tammy had her line broken by another big-un. There were a couple of other coves that had promise as well, but those two were pretty impressive. I knew then that this area would play a role in my fishing during the competition.

The second practice day, we went further up the Rio Grande River and it seemed that the further we went, the fewer big bass we saw, so mid-day we went back down lake and up the East end of the lake and found a big cove with some hydrilla patches with a few big bass catchable around them. The problem was, I figured, it would be over-run by other competitors come tournament time. I never went back to this area.

Third day we ventured up the Diablo River arm a few miles, but did not find anything to our liking except one cove near the bridge with some big fish. I planned on fishing this as a “near to weigh-in” spot.

During practice we focused on several lures, especially Berkley Sinking Minnows rigged weightless and Texas rigged Bungee Power Hawgs, both in Green Pumpkin and watermelon colors. Another lure that would work, if the wind was blowing, was my favorite SwimBait, the 5” Storm Suspending model. I felt if the wind blew, I had a serious chance to bust a big bag with it.

First Tournament day I got my wish for wind. Once again I learned that you have to be careful what you wish for. Forty mile per hour wind was a little more than I really asked for. Thanks to my Triton, I made it to my best cove with the bunch of big-uns in it and started fishing, but I soon found those fish to be not present. By 10:00 a.m. I had only 4 babies that would have weighed 7 pounds or so. Then I made a good decision to go south of the cove into a big flat with a couple of small drain ditches coming off the shore. At 10:05, I caught a 6 pounder on the Storm SwimBait and from there, I got it working and culled my last small fish with an 8 pounder at 12:30 p.m. I knew I had a good bag of fish, and the winds were really howling so headed back down lake through the worst part of the lake. I was really glad to have a Triton at that time. We made it fine back to the weigh-in area and fooled around looking for a big fish and trying to help my co-angler up-grade his catch to little avail. I lead the tournament after weigh-in with 31-10 and took a spot in the Busch Shoot-out along with the bonus from Busch. Best stringer I ever weighed in at a Tournament—AWESOME!!

On the second day, the wind did NOT blow and my big fish did NOT bite my SwimBait, nor much of anything else either. I caught one 5 pounder on it, but the rest of my little old 3 pounders came on a Sinking Minnow rigged wacky style with a small Tru-Tungsten drop shot weight below it. That rig is tremendously effective. You should try it. Results of the weigh-in found me in 16th place—ouch!!

The third day, we had a little wind awhile in the morning and I managed a couple of good bass on the SwimBait, then dead time until about 1:00 p.m. when I picked up a Storm Original Thunderstick and started whacking on them again. I managed to cull up to 22-15 by weigh-in and moved back into contention in the final cut at 11th place.

Now the pressure was really on to perform and move up the leaderboard for the points and payout. I knew my best shot was with the Storm SwimBait, so I mentally prepared myself to make it work. It was little cloudy at first light and I really lit into them and was culling within 15 minutes of arriving on my first spot. Only one bass was over 4 pounds, though and knew I had to catch bigger ones. My main spot seemed to be dead from about 9:00 until 11:00, so I took off for other places to try to cull up. I caught fish from four other new places, but none to help me. At 1:45, I found myself nearby me early morning hotspot, so I thought I should give it another shot. Wow, the fish had grown. I culled all my 3 pounders with 4+ pounders within 10 minutes with a fish on almost every cast of the SwimBait. I stayed in the area until I had to go to weigh-in but never had a really big bite that I needed. I ended up with a smiddly 21-15, but this moved me up to 9th in the final standings so I was pleased with that. I really hoped to make 100 pounds, but had to settle for a measly 93-07. I’ll have to save that goal for Rayburn or Santee-Cooper, or if necessary Guntersville. All these events have the potential to produce big bags, but I truly don’t expect to see anything like the Amistad event for AWHILE. They are claiming Amistad to be the best bass lake in the country and I think the may just be right.

Until next week, Bass wishes.